Will Gordon Brown survive August?

Full coverage of UK PoliticsIt was at around his time that the late Frank Johnson would write his annual column about how it was a myth that nothing important happened in August, and that all sorts of newsworthy events, from the outbreak of the Great War to the death of the Princess of Wales, occurred during the silly season.

Is it possible that August will see a successful putsch against the Prime Minister? I have been arguing all year that, urged by the Broon to "back me or sack me", Labour MPs would reject both options, instead getting the worst of all worlds by keeping the Fifeshire feartie in place while constantly sniping at him. So far, they have followed that script to the letter.

Does David Miliband's intervention change things? It may make some sort of showdown inevitable, for it must now be clear that the Foreign Secretary is finished under Brown. Like Macbeth, he is in blood step'd in so far that, should he wade no more, returning were as tedious as go o'er.

A supposedly clever man, Miliband has behaved very stupidly. Had he concluded that Labour needed a new leader, he could have presented the PM with an ultimatum and, if necessary, resigned. That would have been honest, manly, bold. But to write a passive aggressive article and then unconvincingly deny that it meant what it meant is cowardly. Then again, Brown is pretty cowardly himself. And so, as they have amply proved, are his MPs. Perhaps Labour and Miliband are well suited.